social scoring

a.k.a. your social score, influencer

The act of rating a person's level of influence based on evaluating one's followers, friends, and postings on social networks such as Twitter and Facebook.

Companies now have the capability to score millions, eventually billions, of people on their level of influence. But they are not simply looking at the number of followers or friends you’ve amassed, they also measure influence in more nuanced ways, and post their judgments — in the form of a score — online.

Historical perspecitve: By 2013 the adoption of social scoring in mainstream culture helped build personal brands that could generate millions of dollars in sponsored post revenue for the influencer, usually a celebrity. The thinking became that your rating could help determine how well you are treated by everyone with whom you interact. Critics are increasingly concerned that we are moving closer to creating social media caste systems, where people with high scores get preferential treatment by retailers, prospective employers, even prospective dates.

It is important to note that social scoring is subjective and imperfect. Most analytics companies rely heavily on a user’s Twitter and Facebook profiles, leaving out other online activities, like blogging or postingYouTube videos. As for influence in the offline world — it doesn’t count.